The fluidity of gender

One extremely important and personal topic that we discussed in this class is gender fluidity. I completely and totally believe that gender is fluid. As an active member of the LGBT community I can attest to this statement. I have many friends, and am acquainted with quite a few people who bend the social norms and stereotypes of each specific gender. I have friends who identify as male who were born female, and I know people who identify as female but were born male. I cannot name a single person in my life that fits entirely into either category. Another reason that I am positive that gender is fluid is the fact that there is no such thing as gender in the natural world. Everything that is “feminine” or “manly” is socially constructed. Because of this there is no way that it cannot be fluid. If we were to look at the enormous amounts of culture in the world, we will see that boy and girl are not the only two genders out there. They just happen to be the ones that our society created and enforced. There are cultures out there that recognize way more genders than just our two. I read an article online a few weeks ago that said that the Australian human rights commission recognized TWENTY THREE genders. If that doesn’t prove that gender is fluid, I don’t know what does. There are many people in my life who have altered the way they act, and dress, and even which gender they identify with over the years. So yes, I do believe that gender is entirely fluid, and forcing people into “boy” or “girl” is really close minded of our society.